Sonic The Hedgehog

[Spark Of Spirit]

Four times the development time as Generations and this is all they can put out. The team either doesn't care or are incompetent. I doubt the latter since they made Colors and Generations, so I can't imagine the problem.

They might just need to focus on something new for a while.

[gunswordfist]

Wait, so it's the same team as Colors and Generations?! Did they really make the Generations in one year?! Ugh. Did the character creator take that long to create? They just twindled their thumbs waiting for Mania to come out?

[Spark Of Spirit]

Unleashed was in 2008. Colors was in 2010 and Generations was 2011. Lost World was 2013.

Say what you will about Lost World, but it had a new engine and ground up new assets, and was a full length game with a lot of effort put behind it. Forces had more development time behind it and it's barely even longer than Generations.

This game has had more development time than any Sonic game since the original Sonic Adventure, and this is what comes out. Something is very wrong here.

[Rynnec]

[Nel_Annette]

Wait, so it's the same team as Colors and Generations?! Did they really make the Generations in one year?! Ugh. Did the character creator take that long to create? They just twindled their thumbs waiting for Mania to come out?

The level designers are brand new. Like, BRAND new. Their boss is a guy who worked on Lost World. The level designers from Colors and Generations aren't in the credits.

And it shows.

Jesus Christ, I've only been playing the game for two hours and already feel like I'm 3/4 of the way through the game. The levels are so short and SOOOO unmemorable. Classic Sonic has no reason to be here besides the Mania connection. His levels are terrible. His controls are worse than Generations.

They took a lot of what made Generations great and borked it. They tried to double up on the nostalgia with all the references (Green Hill, Chemical Plant, Death Egg, Westopolis, Seaside Hill, etc.) and brought back a lot of old characters to get speaking roles, all of which I could appreciate if it wasn't tied to this stupid war story that tries to meld the more serious tone of Sonic Adventure 2 with the cartoony Sonic-verse we've had since Colors. It's awkward as hell.

The Avatar is the best part of the game. Controls better than both Sonics and is fun to customize. Music's good for the most part. A lot of great melodies bogged down by Tomoya Ohtani's sudden obsession with heavy synth and dubstep, but I appreciate a return to vocals in level music and Sunset Heights is a fantastic track. Graphics are for the most part really pretty but in cutscenes it seems really artifact-y.

I wish the team from Generations did this. I feel like this took four years because the current team has no fucking clue what they are doing. There's pieces of a good game in here. It just feels like it could have been so much more.

I'll probably go back to playing Mania after I blast through this.

[Rynnec]

This game has had more development time than any Sonic game since the original Sonic Adventure, and this is what comes out. Something is very wrong here.

That's not even half of it.

According to this (and Google Translate, which actually is translating this pretty well!), Sonic Team started basic engine and technological development of Forces about 4 years ago (mainly Hedgehog Engine 2 I'm assuming), with Forces' going through what I'm assuming was a concept phase a year after that, but the actual full-scale production of Sonic Forces began around last year.

So instead of going the Unleashed route of 1.5 years of Hedgehog Engine development and 1.5 years of game development, they went through 3 years of Hedgehog Engine 2 development and decided to spend only 1 year of actual game development.

Nakamura: It is not that I did not put out on purpose. I started development four years ago, but I needed research by switching to a new "Hedgehog Engine 2" engine. Also, it was a time to raise the world of " Sonic toon " including animation from now on overseas, so I was considering various timing such as whether it should be released within 25th anniversary.

 

Nakamura: Yes. The project started four years ago, and we first advanced basic research on new technologies and new engines. A year later, I formed a small team, and finally full-scale production began last year around last year. This time it was longer than usual.

So tl;dr timeline from this:

2013 - Sonic Team begins Hedgehog Engine 2 development
2014-2016 - Sonic Forces concept development with Nakamura's small team
2016-2017 - Actual Sonic Forces game development

More evidence of development being fucked: https://twitter.com/ClydeMandelin/status/930294334007545856

I don't know the first thing about Sonic or this new game but the article says the project began 4 years ago, focused mostly on tech + R&D at first, then a small team took the reins a year later, and then the heavy-duty work got underway last year

10 years. 10 fucking years and Sonic Team hasn't learned a damn thing.

[Spark Of Spirit]

This game has had more development time than any Sonic game since the original Sonic Adventure, and this is what comes out. Something is very wrong here.

That's not even half of it.

According to this (and Google Translate, which actually is translating this pretty well!), Sonic Team started basic engine and technological development of Forces about 4 years ago (mainly Hedgehog Engine 2 I'm assuming), with Forces' going through what I'm assuming was a concept phase a year after that, but the actual full-scale production of Sonic Forces began around last year.

So instead of going the Unleashed route of 1.5 years of Hedgehog Engine development and 1.5 years of game development, they went through 3 years of Hedgehog Engine 2 development and decided to spend only 1 year of actual game development.

Nakamura: It is not that I did not put out on purpose. I started development four years ago, but I needed research by switching to a new "Hedgehog Engine 2" engine. Also, it was a time to raise the world of " Sonic toon " including animation from now on overseas, so I was considering various timing such as whether it should be released within 25th anniversary.

 

Nakamura: Yes. The project started four years ago, and we first advanced basic research on new technologies and new engines. A year later, I formed a small team, and finally full-scale production began last year around last year. This time it was longer than usual.

So tl;dr timeline from this:

2013 - Sonic Team begins Hedgehog Engine 2 development
2014-2016 - Sonic Forces concept development with Nakamura's small team
2016-2017 - Actual Sonic Forces game development

More evidence of development being fucked: https://twitter.com/ClydeMandelin/status/930294334007545856

I don't know the first thing about Sonic or this new game but the article says the project began 4 years ago, focused mostly on tech + R&D at first, then a small team took the reins a year later, and then the heavy-duty work got underway last year

10 years. 10 fucking years and Sonic Team hasn't learned a damn thing.

What in the heck is this?

Sonic the Hedgehog is Sega's flagship franchise and still their biggest seller. After the disaster of 2006 and ten years of learning and they're still at the point that they can't make a competent game without wasting so much time on everything but gameplay. How can they be this clueless?

Whoever is in charge of management is horribly inept to keep letting their developers screw around and sabotage this franchise. It says a lot that we had to get fans to make the best Sonic game this year while Sonic Team can't even put out a product above mediocre. Fans are the only ones keeping the series alive at this point.

This is embarrassing.

[Foggle]

We need a retail collection of Mania and Whitehead ports of Sonic 1, 2, 3&K, and CD ASAP.

[gunswordfist]

Sega, the next time you interfere with great fan games like Streets Of Rage Remake, don't and port it and pay the fans.

[Daikun]

Sonic's creator has joined Square-Enix

[Daikun]

Animated Sonic Mania shorts are coming to the YouTube channel!

[Nel_Annette]

Mighty and Ray are back, baby! And we're finally getting those physical editions.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Mania just keeps getting better. I hope they manage to add those missing scene transitions.

Also, I hope this is a hint that they're working on Mania 2. This team needs to keep it up.

[Kiddington]

Mania just keeps getting better. I hope they manage to add those missing scene transitions.

Also, I hope this is a hint that they're working on Mania 2. This team needs to keep it up.

Yeah that'll a major oversight if they somehow don't end up fixing those. They're already adding so much, really no excuse to gloss over it again.

Nonetheless, I'm excited! Definitely needed (and wanted) an excuse to pick this game up again.

[Mustang]

No secret that I'm not fond of platformers (I'm very finicky/picky) but I do remember enjoying Sonic back in the Sega Genesis days. I do remember enjoying little bits of Sonic Adventure on the Dreamcast as well, but when I got my hands on Shadow the Hedgehog I was pretty much done with the series.

Long story short, I was watching someone play Sonic Mania on YT a couple of days ago and when I saw Super Sonic I was just grinning from ear to ear remembering the good ole days of trying to get Super Sonic, not to mention dreading the water level. Anyway, the video made it's case very clear that I need to get the game, especially since this'll be a good one to show the nephew.

Is it digital only? I'm looking on Amazon and I'm seeing a Sonic Mania Plus but no SM.